from Alternet: Maria Luisa Tucker on Cesar Chavez

Viva la Immigration Debate
Maria Luisa Tucker, AlterNet
April 1, 2006
(Editor's Note: This story was originally posted in The Mix.)
Yesterday, as eight states recognized Cesar Chavez Day as an official
holiday, some groups recalled Chavez's memory in their own fight for
legislation that would provide 11 million undocumented immigrants with
a path toward citizenship.
The conflation of Chavez's work and the fight for compassionate
immigration reform is both right and wrong.
In spirit, it makes sense. Chavez, after all, worked on behalf of the
underdog and always clung to a spirit of nonviolence (just as
pro-immigrant demonstrators have done over the last week). A farm
worker who co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, he has
become a legendy figure of social justice and civil rights for
Chicanos. He followed Gandhi's example and fasted in 1968 to draw
attention to the poor treatment of farm workers. It was this sense of
justice and equality that makes Chavez a person to remember during the
debates on immigration.
However, Chavez was no friend to undocumented immigrants during his
time. He was born a U.S. citizen in Arizona and was loyal to American
farm workers. In fighting for the rights of agricultural workers, in
1969 his union protested farms that hired illegal immigrants as scabs
during a union strike. They even reported some suspected illegal
immigrants to INS.
I point out these two images of Chavez in order to make a point about
the immigration battle that will continue for weeks to come: Just as
Chavez was not a simple man, immigration reform it is not a simple
issue. It is not black and white. There is no perfect answer.
Those who support legalization of undocumented immigrants are not
against unions or worker's rights. Rather, we see that the ability for
families, no matter where they are from, to stay together and make
enough money simply to eat is a human right. The anti-immigrant
legislation that the House has already passed would rip families apart
-- parents who are illegally here would inevitably leave their
children and grandchildren who were born U.S. citizens -- and proposes
to send millions of immigrants back home to starve. I don't believe
this is the kind of "justice" that Cesr Chavez would condone.
Rather than pitting poor American citizens against poor illegal
immigrants, I propose that we take Chavez's vision of social justice
and apply it to all. Let's fight for legalization and workers' rights.
We can demand both, and I believe there is enough American wealth to
support all our nation's laborers and service workers, citizen and
noncitizen, alike. We need to concentrate on forcing those who own the
wealth to share it with their employees, rather than blaming our
nation's newest immigrants for our crappy wages. So, rather than
fighting one another for the pennies that corporations throw at their
workers, let's make the Wal-Marts of the world pay up.
After all, the problem is not a lack of wealth, it is the disparity of
the wealth. Why else would so many Latin American immigrants come
here?

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